"American" Ancestry

[StateBoiler]

To be bluntly honest, most whites just don't know where they're from. Or are just such a mutt that it's impossible to tell. My dad's family is supposedly Irish (although we're not sure, there's no family bible and the basis of our ancestry was my great-grandfather who supposedly said once "we're Irish"; most likely I think we're Scotch-Irish) and my mom's family is German. What am I supposed to mark on the census sheet? Plus, my mom's family has been here since before the Revolution, and my dad's family has been here a minimum of 120 years at least. At some point after so many generations you cease being Irish or German or whatever and you just have to put down "American".

I should mark down I'm a Tarheel that is the son of Hoosiers.

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Don't worry, everyone owned slaves. Even a good number of blacks did in the area I'm from.

[StateBoiler]

To be bluntly honest, most whites just don't know where they're from. Or are just such a mutt that it's impossible to tell. My dad's family is supposedly Irish (although we're not sure, there's no family bible and the basis of our ancestry was my great-grandfather who supposedly said once "we're Irish"; most likely I think we're Scotch-Irish) and my mom's family is German.

I've found that looking at last names of ancestors helps.  My mom claims she's 100% Irish, but based on last names and recollections of accents (and also the fact that my maternal grandmother was Presbyterian before she converted to Catholicism to marry my maternal grandfather) it would seem that she's at most 25% Irish and at least 75% Scotsmen-who-oppressed-the-Irish-and-then-went-to-America-and-blended-in-with-the-other-Irish-Americans.

Based on my last name, it's either Irish, English, or Welsh.

Ooh, I forgot, I also am part Cherokee.

[StateBoiler]

Based on my last name, it's either Irish, English, or Welsh.

What is your last name [qm]

Day.

In Ireland, the Days are also spelled Dea and O'Dea, and those are pronounced exactly the same.

[StateBoiler]

Another 307 thousand claim USA or United States which is collapsed into American.  About 60 thousand claim a specific State (other than Hawaii or Texas) and there are about 6500 Southerners, which are collapsed into "American"

Incidentally, there are 32 thousand who boast of Texas ancestry.  California and New York are next at 8,000 and 4,000 persons who admit such ancestry.

Southerner! In 2010, I'm putting in Southerner.

[StateBoiler]

Based on my last name, it's either Irish, English, or Welsh.

What is your last name [qm]

Day.

In Ireland, the Days are also spelled Dea and O'Dea, and those are pronounced exactly the same.

Actually, unless Day isn't pronounced phonetically, then the pronunciations aren't the same.
Dea and O'Dea would normally be pronounced 'dee' as in deep (at least in Ireland).

That's what a person from Ireland told me beforehand. Asking her if there were any Days in Ireland, she said yes, but they were spelled D-e-a.